Please share:

Like this:

8 Responses to Storytelling, predictions & inferences through video

Great lesson idea! I’ve been thinking of using this video as part of a lesson since I’ve first seen it and I really like the play/stop approach (with an emphasis on vocabulary prior to revealing the ending and discussing it).

Sorry to have to say but I totally predicted the ending (only the bloke was much better-looking than I expected!) Great ad, too. But what a great lesson idea – I’ll give this a go ‘next year’ with my new (secondary) classes.

Haha, yes Louise, I thought about the predictability factor while writing the lesson. I do think we also have some built-in expectation for things like this though, that given it looks like an ad of some sort, that there must be a message attached to it. I doubt all our students would carry the same expectations. Would be worthwhile to figure this out too, though. :)

Fun example. As you say in the title of the post, however, you can use it to do some quite extensive work on inference, reasoning and justifying opinions. This ties in neatly with the important life skill of critical thinking, which is of course even more relevant in academic skills. I’d like to do more with storytelling in class, both by the teacher (an engaging narrative can be a more powerful learning input than a academic text) and by the learner (how to structure a response to input).

Yes, both can be engaging. As “narrative” I was thinking of oral storytelling. This engages the student by making them think on their feet, process the information in real time and interact with the audience — all valuable skills that test linguistic performance, and prevent “hiding” in/behind a text.